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Практичний курс англійської мови навчальний посібник з практики усного та письмового мовлення для студентів 4 курсу

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TEXT 3 ‘The Lawnmower Man’
Circe Цирцея crotch
By Circe?
No sweat. No strain.
Mrs. Dalloway
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TEXT 3 ‘The Lawnmower Man’

4.13 Study the glossary to the article. Find the words in the context and choose the proper translation.

accusing- обвинувальний, осудливий, осудний The accusing look in her eyes conveyed her sense of betrayal. — Її осудливий погляд показував, що вона почуває себе зрадженою. Syn: accusatory

avenger – месник, мстивий

bellow -1. 1) мукання, ревіння (тварин ) 2) покрик, волання,лемент, галасування, репетування, горлання ( людини ) Syn: cry , wail 2. 1) мукати, ревіти ( про тварин ) The bull has been bellowing out all morning. — Бугай ревів увесь ранок. Syn: cry 2) , галасувати, репетувати, горлати ( про людину ) The fireman bellowed out a warning as the burning roof fell. He bellowed a command to his men. He bellowed that he would fight any man at the bar. 3) бушувати, буяти, вирувати, нуртувати ( про бурю )

buddy приятель, друзяка, товарищ bosom buddy — щирий друг old buddy — давній друг Syn: friend , old chap , old boy , old fellow

chore 1) рутинна робота The Ministry of Education hopes to free the teachers from some of their chores. Syn: char , assignment , stint , job , task 2) повсякденні обов'язки, щоденна робота Syn: char 3) важке завдання, неприємна робота Syn: task • - chore work - chore man chore work поденна робота; нормована, визначена умовами/ постановами робота, зумовлена норма

Circe Цирцея

crotch -1) розгалуження, роздоріжжя, розстань (дорога) ; розсоха ( про гілки дерева ) Syn: fork , bifurcation 2) а) вила, вилка, гак Syn: pitchfork 3) скрутне становище, скрута, скрутний стан, вибір, дилема Syn: dilemma

judicious – із здоровим розумом (глуздом), розсудливий, розважливий, розважний It would be judicious to remain silent. Syn: sane , sensible

obscenity 1) непристойність, Syn: indecency , ribaldry , impurity , lewdness 2) непристойна лайка Syn: profanity 3) брудна робота

tromp – гостро, шпарко
4.14 Read the text from ‘The Lawnmower Man’ by Stephen King

FROM The Lawnmower Man

By Stephen King


King, Stephen (1947- ), American author, whose horror and fantasy tales enjoy tremendous popular success. His works are known for turning ordinary situations—such as peer pressure or marital stress—into terrifying ones. King's thrilling plots and prolific output helped reestablish horror fiction as a vital literary genre in the late 20th century. King has also led the way in adopting innovative publishing techniques. Born in Portland, Maine, King wrote his first story at the age of 7 and sold his first piece of writing to a magazine when he was 18 years old. He earned a B.A. degree from the University of Maine at Orono in 1970. In 1973 King’s first novel, Carrie, was published. It is about a woman who exacts deadly revenge on her high school classmates by using her powers of telekinesis. King moved into science fiction with a series of fantasies about Roland of Gilead, entitled The Dark Tower. With some of his works, King explored unusual publishing options. In 1996 he published a six-part monthly serial entitled The Green Mile. By parceling the tale into monthly installments, available as paperback books, King sought to heighten the tension of the novel. (It was made into the movie The Green Mile in 1999.) In 2000 King became one of the first authors to publish a work exclusively as an e-book, or electronic book. Without releasing the story “Riding the Bullet” on paper, King’s publisher made it available online for readers to download onto computers, personal digital assistants (PDAs), or specialized devices for reading e-books.

By mid-July, the lawn looked more like a meadow than a suburbanite's backyard, and Jack Castonmeyer had begun to make all sorts of extremely unfunny jokes, most of which concerned the price of hay and alfalfa. And Don Smith's four-year-old daughter Jenny had taken to hiding in it when there was oatmeal for breakfast or spinach for supper.

One day in late July, Harold went out on the patio during the seventh-inning stretch and saw a woodchuck sitting perkily on the overgrown back walk. The time had come, he decided. He flicked off the radio, picked up the paper, and turned to the classifieds. And halfway down the Part Time column, he found this: Lawns mowed. Reasonable.

776-2390.

Harold called the number, expecting a vacuuming housewife who would yell outside for her son. Instead, a briskly professional voice said, 'Pastoral Greenery and Outdoor Services. . . how may we help you?'

Cautiously, Harold told the voice how Pastoral Greenery could help him. Had it come to this, then? Were lawn-cutters starting their own businesses and hiring office help? He asked the voice about rates, and the voice quoted him a reasonable figure.

Harold hung up with a lingering feeling of unease and went back to the porch. He sat down, turned on the radio, and stared out over his glandular lawn at the Saturday clouds moving slowly across the Saturday sky. Carla and Alicia were at his mother-in-law's and the house was his. It would be a pleasant surprise for them if the boy who was coming to cut the lawn finished before they came back.

He cracked a beer and sighed as Dick Drago was touched for a double and then hit a batter. A little breeze shuffled across the screened-in porch. Crickets hummed softly in the long grass. Harold grunted something unkind about Dick Drago and then dozed off.

He was jarred awake a half hour later by the doorbell. He knocked over his beer getting up to answer it.

A man in grass-stained denim overalls stood on the front stoop, chewing a toothpick. He was fat. The curve of his belly pushed his faded blue overall out to a point where Harold half suspected he had swallowed a basketball.

'Yes?' Harold Parkette asked, still half asleep.

The man grinned, rolled his toothpick from one corner of his mouth to the other, tugged at the seat of his overalls, and then pushed his green baseball cap up a notch on his forehead. There was a smear of fresh engine oil on the bill of his cap. And there he was, smelling of grass, earth, and oil, grinning at Harold Parkette.

'Pastoral sent me, buddy,' he said jovially, scratching his crotch. 'You called, right? Right, buddy?' He grinned on endlessly.

'Oh. The lawn. You?' Harold stared stupidly.

'Yep, me.' The lawnmower man bellowed fresh laughter into Harold's sleep-puffy face.

Harold stood helplessly aside and the lawnmower man tromped ahead of him down the hall, through the living room and kitchen, and on to the back porch. Now Harold had placed the man and everything was all right. He had seen the type before, working for the sanitation department and the highway repair crews out on the turnpike. Always with a spare minute to lean on their shovels and smoke Lucky Strikes or Camels, looking at you as if they were the salt of the earth, able to hit you for five or sleep with your wife any time they wanted to. Harold had always been slightly afraid of men like this; they were always tanned dark brown, there were always nets of wrinkles around their eyes, and they always knew what to do.

'The back lawn's the real chore,' he told the man, unconsciously deepening his voice. 'It's square and there are no obstructions, but it's pretty well grown up.' His voice faltered back into its normal register and he found himself apologizing: 'I'm afraid I've let it go.'

'No sweat, buddy. No strain. Great-great-great.' The lawnmower man grinned at him with a thousand travelling-salesmen jokes in his eyes. 'The taller, the better. Healthy soil, that's what you got there, by Circe. That's what I always say.'

By Circe?

The lawnmower man cocked his head at the radio. Yastrzemski had just struck out. 'Red Sox fan? I'm a Yankees man, myself.' He clumped back into the house and down the front hall. Harold watched him bitterly.

He sat back down and looked accusingly for a moment at the puddle of beer under the table with the overturned Coors can in the middle of it. He thought of getting the mop from the kitchen and decided it would keep.

No sweat. No strain.

He opened his paper to the financial section and cast a judicious eye at the closing stock quotations. As a good Republican, he considered the Wall Street executives behind the columned type to be at least minor demigods -(By Circe??) -and he had wished many times that he could better understand the Word, as handed down from the mount not on stone tablets but in such enigmatic abbreviations as pct. and Kdk and 3.28 up 2/3. He had once bought a judicious three shares in a company called Midwest Bisonburgers, Inc., that had gone broke in 1968. He had lost his entire seventy-five-dollar investment. Now, he understood, bisonburgers were quite the coming thing. The wave of the future. He had discussed this often with Sonny, the bartender down at the Goldfish Bowl. Sonny told Harold his trouble was that he was five years ahead of his time, and he should...

A sudden racketing roar startled him out of the new doze he had just been slipping into.

Harold jumped to his feet, knocking his chair over and staring around wildly.

'That's a lawnmower?' Harold Parkette asked the kitchen. 'My God, that's a lawnmower?'

He rushed through the house and stared out of the front door. There was nothing out there but a battered green van with the words PASTORAL GREENERY, INC. painted on the side. The roaring sound was in back now. Harold rushed through his house again, burst on to the back porch, and stood frozen.

It was obscene.

It was a travesty.

The aged red power mower the fat man had brought in his van was running on its own. No one was pushing it; in fact, no one was within five feet of it. It was running at a fever pitch, tearing through the unfortunate grass of Harold Parkette's back lawn like an avenging red devil straight from hell. It screamed and bellowed and farted oily blue smoke in a crazed kind of mechanical madness that made Harold feel ill with terror. The overripe smell of cut grass hung in the air like sour wine.

But the lawnmower man was the true obscenity.

The lawnmower man had removed his clothes - every stitch. They were folded neatly in the empty birdbath that was at the centre of the back lawn. Naked and grass-stained, he was crawling along about five feet behind the mower, eating the cut grass. Green juice ran down his chin and dripped on to his pendulous belly. And every time the lawnmower whirled around a corner, he rose and did an odd, skipping jump before prostrating himself again.

'Stop!' Harold Parkette screamed. 'Stop that!'

But the lawnmower man took no notice, and his screaming scarlet face never slowed. If anything, it seemed to speed up. Its nicked steel grill seemed to grin sweatily at Harold as it raved by.
4.15 Use the expressions below in the sentences of your own. Try to make a connected text describing your experience of uneasy applying for a new job or hiring some odd people.




to make all sorts of extremely unfunny jokes, most of which concerned …

a briskly professional voice

a lingering feeling of unease

a pleasant surprise for

cast a judicious eye at

looking at you as if they were the salt of the earth, able to hit you for five or sleep with your wife any time they wanted to

The time had come

to grin at smb with a thousand travelling-salesmen jokes in your eyes

to ask about rates

to be at least minor demigods

to bellow fresh laughter into one’s face.

to call the number, expecting a…

to grunt something unkind about

to hire office help

To place the man

to quoted a reasonable figure

To see the type before

to start own businesses

to take to

to the true obscenity

to turn to the classifieds

to wish many times that he could better understand the Word

told the voice how Pastoral Greenery could help him



4.16 Discuss the following questions:



  • Characterise the text under study. Say what features make it a sample of a science fiction. Illustrate your answer citing the text.
  • Trace the gradual increase of the tension up to its highest point. Comment on the tone of this passage before and after the turning point. What emotional key is given?
  • Characterise the people involved in the conflict. How does the the writer achieve their psychological portrayal without resorting to direct ways of characterisation?
  • Speak on the concluding part, its tone and the means the author resorts to in conveying Harold Parkette’s emotions.
4.17 Evaluating a story. Study this piece of theory and try to define round and flat characters in the extract under analysis. Prove your choice.

The characters of a book are the fictional figures who move through the plot.
Authors describe the more simple- FLAT- characters in novels with no more than a few phrases that identify the character’s most important traits. These characters have little capacity for personal growth, and they appear in the novel as limited but necessary elements of the plot. Despite their small parts, such characters are often vivid. For example, in the novella The Bear (1942) by American author William Faulkner, the main character, Ike McCaslin, is introduced to his family’s tradition of hunting. Some modern novelists reinterpret ancient myths and give new attention to characters. Gardner’s novel tells the same story, but it is cast from the point of view of the monster. To give these – ROUND - characters motives for their actions, authors highlight the characters’ thoughts, feelings, conflicting impulses, and capacity for change. Richly textured and detailed characters who are strongly affected by events in their lives, like Anna, exist in works throughout the history of the novel, but they especially flourished in the 19th century. With specific tastes and traits, these characters appear to the reader fully realized as true-to-life individuals. Famous 19th-century literary characters include Emma Woodhouse, the willful, witty, and playful main character in Emma (1816) by English author Jane Austen; Emma Bovary, an extravagant and sensual woman in Madame Bovary (1857) by French novelist Gustave Flaubert; and Dorothea Brooke, who loses her idealism in Middlemarch (1871-1872) by English writer George Eliot.

English novelist Virginia Woolf followed this approach to explore the characters of an Englishwoman and a young former soldier in Mrs. Dalloway (1925). The absence of firmly stamped characters is a feature of the nouveau roman (new novel), a type of novel that developed in France in the 1950s.
Other novelists move in the opposite direction and place true-life people in their works, attempting to portray the people in great detail. Some novelists use historical figures not as main characters but as elements of a backdrop to a fictional story. American writer E. L. Doctorow takes this approach in Ragtime (1975), a book about three families in early-20th-century America.
4.18 Give a summary of your comments on the text.